


Nos Années Lycée

by Yngvildr the Voracious (Yngvildr_the_Voracious)



Series: McHanzo Week 2016 [3]
Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Day 3, French, French people will relate, Lycée AU, M/M, McCree is such a L tbh, Sorry for the French High School Acronyms, i am so regretting this, so much french ptn..., trans!McCree, wesh maggle baguette RPZ
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-19
Updated: 2016-12-19
Packaged: 2018-09-09 22:30:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,357
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8915497
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Yngvildr_the_Voracious/pseuds/Yngvildr%20the%20Voracious
Summary: So... I debated for a very long time : should I write this in French? Should I write it in English? In the end, it came easier in English than in French but I totally understand if someone who has not been to a Lycée, either in France or abroad, doesn't understand all the acronyms and the strange culture of the Lycée. And yet... I wouldn't change it for the world (except for the normal stuff like accidentally confessing to your crush, chosing track instead of muscle building for the P.E. exam etc...)Again, a lot of this is based on my own experience in Lycée, something that started a whooping ten years ago (I feel so old omg...)Thnkfully the character fashioned after my little brother has more help and more friends. Yes the Surprise Character... Will you guess who it is?!





	

**Author's Note:**

> So... I debated for a very long time : should I write this in French? Should I write it in English? In the end, it came easier in English than in French but I totally understand if someone who has not been to a Lycée, either in France or abroad, doesn't understand all the acronyms and the strange culture of the Lycée. And yet... I wouldn't change it for the world (except for the normal stuff like accidentally confessing to your crush, chosing track instead of muscle building for the P.E. exam etc...)
> 
> Again, a lot of this is based on my own experience in Lycée, something that started a whooping ten years ago (I feel so old omg...)
> 
> Thnkfully the character fashioned after my little brother has more help and more friends. Yes the Surprise Character... Will you guess who it is?!

Jesse inhaled the smoke and opened his mouth. He was still shit at making smoke rings. He figured that, since it was shit to smoke at sixteen, (seventeen today, damn, he almost forgot) it was fair. 

 

The bell was about to ring the end of recess and already, the young student of the French Lycée Bellegarde was bored. 

 

Around him, every smoker, teachers and students alike, were chatting. Some of them about class, others about politics or even TV. Madame la Proviseure, Madame Amari, was smoking with the teachers, speaking in hushed tones about budget and  _ rectorat  _ politics. 

 

The three toned ringing could be heard even from the outside of the big grey building and its grey gates. Looking around, Jesse tried to look for Monsieur Reyes, the French and Literature professor and Head Teacher of the whole class of Terminale L, jointly with Monsieur Morrison, the Philosophy teacher. 

 

With which he was about to have a double period. Oh damn, he was just going to die. Sometimes, Jesse wondered if he should have gone to Sciences, like his foster parents told him to. Four hours of philosophy a week instead of eight and  _ It will open more doors. You can be a photograph with an S Bac… _

 

And indeed, the Arts class he had chosen as his specialty didn’t cover photography until the very end of the Terminale year. Instead, they had covered History and drawed a lot, something Jesse had never liked. At least, he got better at sketching, but compared to Amélie Sylvestre’s detailed works of art, he was just feeling like he was an embarrassment. 

 

“Hey, McCree.” he heard behind him. 

 

The gruff voice could only belong to one person. 

 

“Hey, hello M’sieur Reyes!” Jesse exclaimed. 

 

Jesse loved the man to pieces ever since he stepped foot in his first proper French class in Seconde. Before that, Jesse had to go through remedial French as a Foreign Language and retake his Brevet des Collèges. 

 

The fifteen years olds entering Monsieur Gabriel Reyes’ class had been received by the tall dark skinned man, his scars made prominent by the bleak neon lighting of the room. 

 

“You guys think you have three years to prepare for the Bac, but it starts here. You have precisely two years to show you’ve mastered French language, culture and literature. It’s going to be hard, especially to you, little smartasses who thought they could handle the Lycée Français on French soil.”

 

His gaze had immediately zeroed in on Jesse and the boy next to him. The young American had just thought he was in deep shit. Well, at least, he read stuff in French already. What if it weren’t exactly the classics? He could catch up!

 

Reyes had handled the class of Seconde like boot camp and when Jesse chose L, he did so knowing Reyes had the class that was to sit the Baccalauréat Littéraire in his iron fist gloved in velvet. 

 

Jesse had been happy to leave the French and Maths exams behind with top marks, well ahead in terms of points to apprehend the Terminale and the final exam with ease.

 

So yes, Jesse really liked Monsieur Reyes. 

 

“So, little ingrate, you ever going to go to class or should I tell Monsieur Morrison you’ll be late?”

 

“Well, I haven't finished my smoke Monsieur Reyes, and I also can tell him I had a question for you.”

“Shoot.” Reyes told the boy, apparently well aware this was nothing but sass and an excuse to be late.

 

“Why do you think the ministry chose Tōkaidōchū Hizakurige?” Jesse asked. It was almost a genuine question. Being raised mostly American and homeschool before he lost his parents, he sometimes found that he missed the main reasons why French did things. 

 

Reyes laughed. 

 

“Nowadays the Literature class program always makes us study a foreign work of art or writing. To get perspective after so many years with your nose in French stuff, mostly. Style is different, culture is different… And we wonder why it stuck there and not here, why it’s a classic for them and not for us. L students were supposed to be these paragons of  _ Lettres _ , masters of tongue and quill. Napoleon upon creating it, was forming his Ambassadors, a lot of them followed through with Langues’O, you know that one?”

 

Jesse was indeed familiar with the university specialised in Eastern languages, he heard his older foster brother Mako talk about going to their library. What a student doing a Licence Professionelle in Industrial Management was supposed to do in a library dedicated to foreign languages was a mystery. 

 

“This is the closest to an answer I can give you, honestly.” Reyes added, gesturing toward the gates where Jamie, the twitchy supervisor who had a heavy Australian accent whenever he spoke English, was waiting for them to come in, bored. “Let’s get back inside before Jamie explodes.” 

 

It was late and Reyes was too, so he accompanied Jesse all the way to the Philosophy class. 

 

“I’m not in a hurry to teach the Secondes this year. Your boyfriend’s little brother is simply  _ une pile électrique _ .”

 

“ _ Pika, pika. _ ” Jesse squeaked as they reached the door of room one o’ two, Morrison’s usual room, unless it was a Friday, then the Engineering theory class for the Terminales who had taken the option usually happened there.  

 

“I’m pretty sure that’s racist.” Reyes admonished. 

 

“I’ll ask Hanzo.” the boy shrugged. He did his best to ask and then nuke anything offensive from his vocabulary and behaviour. 

 

Thankfully, Hanzo had been helpful and kept on teaching him how to behave. In return, Jesse taught him about his trans identity and how to be respectful of his own person and the others he might encounter. A win win situation between two open minded young men. 

 

Damn, he loved Hanzo, Jesse thought as he let Morrison’s droning lull him to an open eyed kind of sleep. 

 

After that first day of class back in Seconde (Jesse couldn’t help but feel weird upon thinking this happened only two years ago), two foreigners in a sea of French natives, or damn near it, had spent their days together working on Reyes’ assignments. Mostly exchanging tips about words, their meaning, the quirks in pronunciation. Jesse was especially nervous about the oral examination of the French test, then. His pronunciation was subpar, at least, that’s what he had thought then. He was really afraid the examiner would dock him points the moment he opened his mouth with his unmistakably American accent. 

 

“Your accent is really good, Jesse.” Hanzo had told him when he had confessed that one day, as they were working in the library. “Better than my English accent.”

 

“No, it’s not. It’s unfair. Japanese and French have so many sounds in common.”

 

“Japanese doesn’t have nasal vowels.” Hanzo tutted. “I had exactly the same problems as you. It just takes a lot of practice. You still have four months until June and you’re in a French Lycée in France, you practice all the time.”

 

Jesse didn’t believe that. He went to the town’s library and dug up scientific books about linguistics. There was indeed a lot of work involved in retraining one’s throat that way and it felt unattainable. Unless he stopped smoking, but he didn’t quite see how he could do that yet. 

 

“Maybe ask Monsieur Reyes.” Hanzo offered, looking at Jesse with a concerned look. 

 

“Why?” Jesse asked. “I don’t see how it’s going to help.”

 

“His parents are Mexican-Americans.” Hanzo told him. “He probably knows what you’re going through..”

 

“No, I can’t do that, he’s gonna eat me, chew me and defenestrate me in a single spit.” Jesse groaned. 

 

So Jesse felt somehow betrayed when at the end of the next French class, Hanzo rose his hand and asked out loud, in front of the whole class, about accents during the official oral examination. 

 

“The teacher is supposed to judge you on your mastery of French language and culture and your comprehension of the text. Accent is irrelevant. If it seems to you that a particular  _ way of speaking _ made a difference for the worst, you would be in your right to file a formal complaint for discrimination. Racial discrimination, even.” Reyes answered, sounding grim. 

 

He had then looked at the whole overcrowded class, especially at the back where Bilal Mbengué, who liked to call himself Doomfist and perpetually bothered the class with chatter was listening intently, for once. He did speak French with a sort of animated accent and a heavy banging of the vowels opposed with a disappearance of most consonants Jesse had never heard before meeting the tall black guy who was French raised too. It wasn’t the slow and calm rise and slow of Angela’s Swiss French, the faster less accented Savoyard of Amélie or Tracer’s constant Parisian squeaking that made Jesse think of Californian Valley girls. 

 

“ _ Ne laissez absolument personne vous emmerder à cause de votre accent. _ ” Reyes had hammered, stressing on the more than familiar expression. “Especially not someone who thinks they’re in power and might look down on you for it. Whether they think themselves superior because of the age difference, the colour of your skin, the shape of your eyes, the number of chromosomes and limbs you’ve got or even what’s between your legs...”

 

The bell rang, the three toned dings deafening in the silence of the class. 

 

“They can go fuck themselves if they ever pull that on you. If you think it happened, you go straight to  _ my _ email. Now get the fuck out of here, you’re going to be late for your options classes.”

 

Upon leaving the classroom, Jesse, shaken, stopped just next to the door. He had his art option class, but he didn’t want to go there. He wanted to get under a rock. 

 

“I’m sorry.” he heard behind him, softly. In a heavy accented English. 

 

“It’s ok, Hanzo. You have Economics, don’t be late.” Jesse answered in kind, his voice hollow. 

 

He had been overly aware of his body at this moment. The word for what he was just experiencing hung in his head. He had been so focused on his accent problem he had completely forgotten how else he could be singled out. 

 

“Jesse, are you ok?” Hanzo asked. 

 

The words were almost unrecognisable. He didn’t know if it was the accent or...

 

Jesse shook his head. He wasn’t right at all, but Hanzo calling his name was ok. 

 

“Do you want me to accompany you to the… The school’s nurse?” he asked, tentatively. 

 

No, it would pass, he wanted to say. Instead, he walked, dazed, to the boys bathroom. 

 

“How can I help?” Hanzo asked again, in French. “You’re not alright but I don’t know how to help, do you need to go home? We can be in the CPE’s office in a minute, they’d call your parents.”

 

“It’s ok.” Jesse finally answered as he touched the walls. Steadying cool tiled walls. He put his back to it and slowly let himself be dragged down until he reached a sitting position. 

 

“Is it ok if I sit next to you? I don’t want you to… To pass out into my arms.” Hanzo literally translated into English. 

 

Jesse wanted to chuckle but he couldn’t, not at the time. He smiled, though. He heard Hanzo’s sign of relief. 

 

“You know, whatever happens, we’re friends, right?” Hanzo said after they heard the bell signaling the end of the option class hour. They had missed Art and Economy. Somehow, their hands had found each other, their fingertips touching. 

 

“Yeah.” Jesse said. “We’re friends.”

 

“Good, because I can’t skip classes for anything less than a friend in need of support.” Hanzo told him. 

 

He slowly rose. He offered his hand to help Jesse upwards. The young American’s heart started to beat faster when the force of their pull made him crash into Hanzo’s firm chest. 

 

“I’m… I’m sorry.” Jesse told Hanzo, rubbing his ribs where his binder was tightly securing him. 

 

“If it hurts you, you should take the time to release it a bit. We have a bit of time, it’s recess.” Hanzo told him, looking genuinely worried earnest. “I mean… I don’t know a lot about those things, but your blood has to keep flowing, right…”

 

Jesse thought he was cute when he was blushing. He was also very cute when he was taking care of him. 

 

“You’re right, but I wear an actual  _ binder _ , not bandages.” Jesse informed Hanzo. “It’s like a very tight shirt. Adjustment is not quite necessary.”

 

“Oh.” Hanzo exclaimed. “Well… I learned something.” 

 

He was quick to regain his bearings. He slowly pushed Jesse away, much to the other boy’s disappointment. 

 

“Maybe we should head to the Maths class straight away. We skipped one, two would be unreasonable.” he told him. 

 

As Hanzo was about to open the door, Jesse called his name and kissed his lips as he turned. The Japanese boy’s eyes went wide and were filled with something that looked like terror. A terror Jesse felt acutely in his own heart. Sidestepping around Hanzo, he fled and chose to sit next to Winston in Maths class. 

 

How they had been able to mend things was a miracle. 

 

*

**

*

 

Everyone saw Hanzo accompany Jesse to the bathroom and a lot of people had been scared there had been a terrible misunderstanding there. 

 

Jesse was quite tired to repeat that Hanzo had been a great help. Watching him from afar, Jesse realised maybe he was the one who had not been a gentleman. Kissing another person unexpectedly so. 

 

“Hey, Jesse.”

 

In French class, everybody had their own habits and only Doomfist sat mostly alone during those, so he had no choice but to bear with the guy if he wanted to avoid Hanzo. Good thing Jesse followed the ongoing Boxing Championnat de France, because otherwise he would have no idea of what the boy was talking about. 

 

“Your gay friend said to Angela he missed the time you spent in the library.” Doomfist whispered to him. “I thought you had the gays for him too, what happened?”

 

Jesse sighed. He wanted to follow Reyes’ lesson on Verlaine. He didn’t have time to explain that he had kissed someone without their consent, or attract the ire of the teacher. 

 

“It’s nothing, a misunderstanding.” Jesse tried to dismiss in a much subtler whisper. “And just because people are gay doesn’t mean they’re interested in each other. Same goes for every orientation really.”

 

“I know that.” Doom exclaimed, a tad too loud, earning a glare from Reyes. “But I mean, you two, it’s obvious. Like Amélie and Gérard. You looked at each other with those puppy eyes and you were in the library all the time. Still do, for real. Really, you should be gay together. Gays are happy with other gays, right?”

 

“It helps.” Jesse sighed, wanting to laugh. 

 

“Anyway, Hanzo, I guess if I was gay, I’d understand. I mean, he’s beautiful right… Maybe invite him to Gérard’s Boum!”

 

Jesse frowned. 

 

“Isn’t Boums a thing for kids?” he asked, unsure. He remembered hearing about the 1980’s film with Sophie Marceau and others saying the word referring to daytime parties with music and soft drinks, usually birthdays ( _ annivs _ ). High school was way too grown up to have a Boum.

 

“Yeah, but it’s Eighties themed. So Gérard said it’s gonna be called a Boum. He said he’s going to be Michael Jackson in Thriller and Amélie agreed to be Morticia Adams, the old school version… Go in a matching costume, you’d be pretty, both of you!” Doom hit Jesse’s shoulder blades with his massive paws. 

 

“Bilal, you think you can whip up some poetry to match Verlaine’s?” Reyes asked from the blackboard. 

 

“ _ Wesh _ , I’m writing a poem about the gay love Jesse has for Hanzo!” Bilal shouted, making Jesse’s ears turn red. His forehead made an audible thud that drowned out the classroom’s laughter. 

 

This was it, Jesse was about to die of shame at this very moment. 

 

“SILENCE!” Reyes shouted, earning the quiet. “Now, the only gay love I want to hear about right now, is Verlaine’s absolute hots for Rimbaud.” he added, making students cackle again at his turn of phrase. 

 

*

**

*

 

“JESSE!” 

 

Morrison’s voice snapped Jesse out of his reverie. 

 

“If your desk was made to be slept on, it would be called a bed. Now, remind us of Kant’s main titles.”

 

“There’s three, three Critics.” Jesse chanced. 

 

“No partial answers.”

 

“Critic of Pure Reason, Critic of Practical Reason and… Critic of Judging?”

 

“Critic of Judgement.” Morrison scolded the boy. “You have not earned a  _ colle _ . For now. Pay. Attention.” 

 

Jesse did his best. He missed Hanzo’s presence in class. Ever since they chose their paths at the end of Seconde, they only saw each other in passing, usually in between classes. In Première, they would always have time for a kiss when Reyes exchanged his ESs against the Ls, but now Reyes only Terminale Class was the L for the Literature class and French for the ES and the S had been moved out of their schedule to make room for their own Philosophy class. Hanzo had told him about those. It seemed that Morrison was far more lenient with the classes that did not have a multiplier of nine on their final exam’s grade in his field. 

 

Not that Hanzo didn’t have his own share of problems. English as a second language, for example, but Jesse helped him with that, provided the Japanese boy didn’t sass him in German.

 

After Doomfist thoroughly embarrassed Jesse and Hanzo in French class back then, Jesse had avoided Gérard and any mention of his Boum like the plague. He had isolated himself, only speaking sometimes with Doomfist. Then June had shown its sunny nose. 

 

With the older students nervously shuffling back to school on the morning of the fifteenth for their various Baccalauréat exams, the Secondes were free to go and wait nervously for the Conseil de Classe to approve their final choice of paths. Jesse had of course applied for the Baccalauréat Litéraire, cementing his choice to keep Arts in his curriculum. Angela had of course picked the Baccalauréat Scientifique with the Biology specialty and to no one’s surprise, Bilal “Doomfist” Mbengué, took a shortcut to the Baccalauréat Génie Industriel in another school. 

 

“Well, it’s my second choice in fact, but I’m sure they won’t want me to go to the Bac S Ingénieur with my record.” he commented to Jesse one day as they smoked during recess. “And with Engineering being my only good class with Maths, but very bad grades in Physics… They might just shuffle me to the Bac Technologiques with all the others suburban low lives like me. It was a real chance to even get into this school this year. I’m lucky I live nearby. Did me a lot of good, alright.”

 

“Why wouldn’t they want you to go to your first choice of class?” Jesse asked, not understanding.

 

“Each school wants to keep their high scores, y’know. Just… The class with the best success rate, the best special mentions rates… I’d mess it up.” Doomfist drawled, not bothering with removing the bitterness from his tone. 

 

“Well, even if you don’t get your first choice, at least you can go into an engineering school with a Tech Bac anyway…” Jesse tried to cheer him up. He didn’t really look into the system of attribution of places for higher education yet. He was pretty certain he wouldn’t get into a school, despite the money his parents left when they died. 

 

“Yeah.” the tall boy said, sounding like he didn’t really believe it. “ _ Wesh _ , we don’t have all day!” he suddenly exclaimed, shaking the gloom and transforming it in some kind of aggression directed at the air. ”Where are the Ms,  _ wesh _ !”

 

Jesse found the board with the list of surnames starting with M quick enough, looking for McCree and finding himself at the top under “Jesse MacCree”, of course and Doomfist raged because they added an apostrophe between the M and the B of Mbengué.

 

“Seriously, they’re really pushing it too far, they butchered your name too, come on! Let’s go to the office, I’m sure Amari’s there…”

 

Jesse only had the time to briefly confirm the letter next to his line specifying his option (Art, of course he nailed it) and let Doomfist grab the collar of his shirt to drag him to the administration offices. 

 

“Come on, they still don’t know how to write my fucking name. I’ve sent them so much letters about it, had my mom sign them and everything…”

 

“It’s ok, Doomfist. Maybe they had a problem because it was the middle of the school year, I had the same problem.”

 

For some reason, his deadname had come up in the files. Thankfully, within the hour, every teacher knew his name, his pronouns, despite taking two weeks to change it to the butchered version in the actual class roster sheet. Proviseure Amari wrote to him specifically to apologise on behalf of the school. It seemed his foster parents got mixed up when sending his birth certificate, sending the one that had not been amended. She had inquired on a somewhat monthly basis on his well being ever since. Usually at recess, during her occasional smoke. Amari had a place right next to Reyes in Jesse’s esteem for how thoughtful she was. 

 

“Jesse MacCree”, testament to the hurry of the administration was in to mend their mistake, was a small price to pay. 

 

Madame la Proviseure was on site, running to and fro. It seemed the Philosophy exam had just ended for all students and she was now supervising the sending of something like a ton of anonymised copies to the Rectorat. 

 

“Can I help you, Monsieur McCree, Monsieur Mbengué?”

 

With her steel grey hair, the tattoo beneath her eyes and the way she had just ran from one room to the other, taking a pallet filled with papers and running to load the truck without breaking a sweat made even Doomfist fizzle and spit like a wet torch. 

 

“Euh… I… Thank you for giving me my first choice, M’dame.” he squeaked, looking at his feet and then back at Madame Amari. 

 

“Oh, you’re welcome, Monsieur Mbengué.” the Proviseure told him. 

 

She looked around and, satisfied, rubbed her hands together, despite the weather being extremely warm. 

 

“Follow me. You too, Mr McCree.”

 

She led them to the first room Jesse had ever seen of the high school: the textbook hall. 

 

Jesse had only been once in this room. It was extremely rare to do so, he heard. Usually students only stepped foot in the dusty basement once their studies were finished. Students received their manuals at the beginning of the year and gave them back on the last day of class, except the Premières, who gave back their French, Math and in some cases, History books on the last day of their exams to the CPE’s office upon leaving the building.

 

However, the Terminale class gave theirs back in early August, after their eventual resit in July. Jesse, having had to change his name on the record, had been escorted there to sign the papers again on an updated signing sheet. He hadn’t been looking forward to come back to the dusty hangar like basement, though. 

 

“Mademoiselle Vaswani? I believe I have two students coming to rectify their names on the records.” Madame Amari called. 

 

From the depths of this library of sorts, a woman with dark skin and a blue sari came out. She was extremely pretty and sat up really straight. 

 

“Yes. I’ll be there right away, let me give instructions to Hanzo about the new manuals’ classification. We received Economics textbooks with actualised figures and he wanted to look at them, I must assure myself that...”

 

“I know the classification Madame Vaswani.” Hanzo’s voice came from the back. “I’ll put it in place, don’t worry.”

 

Jesse felt his heart beat wildly, but he was already hushed to the exit of the room and back to fresh air. 

 

Miss Vaswani took their names, asked for an ID. Doomfist stuttered his answer, but he had his bus card with him, which the administrator accepted upon looking at the teenager up and down with a disapproving look that made him squirm. Jesse gave his soon to expire resident card. 

 

“You know you can apply for French citizenship as soon as you reach sixteen years of age, Mister McCree?” Madame Vaswani supplied. 

 

“Hmm… I didn’t think about it.” Jesse admitted. 

 

“Please, ask your parents or guardians about it. It will greatly simplify your life and potential employment.” she added, her tone mildly annoyed. 

 

They were shown their way out with the reassurance that next year, their names would be appropriately spelled. 

 

Not knowing what to do next, Jesse went to sit on the steps leading to the building’s double doors. Several Terminale students passing their exams were already studying for the upcoming afternoon’s ordeal, sweating, chugging energy drinks or even smoking something stronger than a cigarette, despite being on the inside of the gate. The high school didn’t look right, deserted as it was without the Première, the Secondes and the teachers gone to lunch elsewhere.

 

“Congratulations on making it into the Bac S class, Bilal.” McCree told Doomfist. 

 

“Congratulations on making it into the Lazy Train.” Doomfist retorted in good nature, clapping Jesse’s back. 

 

“Hey, us artsy folks have a class of our own, for sure!” Jesse chuckled, not at all put off by the small rivalry between the students. The upperclassmen had warned them throughout the year. 

 

The sun shone on the grey tiles of the steps, Doomfist threw his head back and laughed. Jesse wondered why. Maybe it was relief.

 

“Ok, I’m outta here, boy. See you in September!” the boy exclaimed, rising with one smooth gesture and clapping Jesse’s hand in his huge paw before applying a fist bump, the usual  _ check _ . “And don’t turn around, gay boy!” he added with a huge smile before running, a cigarette already ready to be lit as soon as he passed the gate. 

 

Of course, Jesse turned around. It was Hanzo, looking at him, his usual stately demeanor making the other boy’s heart beat wildly. 

 

*

**

*

 

“The bell rung, Jesse, you can wake up.” Monsieur Morrison’s voice said in his ear. “You should take Philosophy more seriously. You have the ability to think, Jesse, use it!”

 

“Hmm… Yes, M’sieur Morrison.” Jesse mumbled. 

 

“You’ll hand me a proper essay on the text we just reviewed in class next week instead of the one after like the others, won’t you, my boy?”

 

“Yes, M’sieur Morrison.” Jesse just hurried up. It was lunch. And lunch meant Hanzo was probably waiting for him. 

 

And indeed he was.  _ La Cantoche _ , or rather, Lycée Bellegarde cafeteria was noisy, between the beeping of everyone’s passes, the chatter of students and teachers alike, the clanking of cutlery being used or disposed of, as well as the noise coming from the too tiny kitchen and the back and forth between the cooks and the undecided teenagers wondering if they should pick the  _ plat du jour _ or the vegetarian option. 

 

Jesse picked the  _ plat du jour _ , a chicken filet with a side of veggies. Hanzo picked the meat pie. Behind him, Mei Ling, a student in Première S was picking the vegan dish. 

 

“My head is the size of a pumpkin and here I am.” Hanzo started as they found a corner of the great mess of the cafeteria that was somewhat less noisy. It was far from the overcrowded water dispensers and the plates disposal and also quite far from the regional cheese tasting animation and the seat reserved for the students attending the Collège Bellegarde. Jesse was glad he had skipped on these upon seeing the little imps who thought themselves all grown up because they had their first growth spurt. 

 

“Come on, it’s not nice to compare Reinhardt with the little kids.” Jesse admonished and pouring some water into Hanzo’s glass. 

 

“You didn’t check the jug!” he exclaimed as Jesse was about to help himself.

 

“Oops, sorry!” he remembered, exchanging his empty glass with the one he filled for Hanzo.. 

 

They had realised it saved them a trip to the water dispenser to use jugs left over by previous eaters and less of a waste too. Unless there was a half eaten chicken nugget floating in it, of course. This one seemed safe and upon tasting it, Jesse found that no one had emptied a couple of salt capsules in it. 

 

“Ha, remember when one time we found one that was just completely filled with ketchup.” Jesse chuckled as he finally poured Hanzo a drink. 

 

His boyfriend glared. 

 

“Come on, that was a funny one!” he kept on. 

 

“It could indeed have been funny, had I not been wearing my white kendogi.” Hanzo pouted. 

 

Startled, Hanzo had let go of the heavy metal jug and spilt the red sticky tomato and sugar juice all over his kendo gear. 

 

“By the way, still training this afternoon?” Jesse asked. 

 

“Yes. Apparently, we are enough Kendo practitioners applying for the extra P.E. Bac bonus points to hold a little tournament after the examination of our katas.” Hanzo nodded. 

 

“How much is enough?”

 

“Ten kendoka.” Hanzo supplied after swallowing a piece of overcooked pie. 

 

“Ten people? Ten people picked Kendo as their extra P.E. bonus points?” Jesse repeated. “You’re not just talking about the region right.”

 

“Yes, ten participants nation wide.” Hanzo explained. “The Junior European Champion is going to be there.” he added, his lips pursed. 

 

Jesse recognised the worry in the lines of Hanzo’s forehead. He both disliked and loved them, because when they appeared, he could kiss them away. 

 

Letting his fork down onto the platter, Jesse brought his lips to Hanzo’s forehead, enjoying the creeping of his boyfriend’s blush. 

 

“Stop that.” Hanzo mumbled, flustered. 

 

It had taken time, but Jesse had learned Hanzo meant  _ stop that for now _ . The hard way, almost. 

 

That sunny day where Jesse had confirmed his choice and he had turned around, not knowing Doomfist was playing with reverse psychology (of course he was going to turn around, what was he to do?), he had seen Hanzo, an Economics adorned a white number. Next year’s textbook. How did he manage to convince Vaswani to let him take it was a mystery. He probably signed a huge pile of paper. 

 

However, Hanzo didn’t just have his textbook in advance. He was also speaking.

 

“Hey, Jesse.” he had called. 

 

And both boys had been petrified as soon as there was less than five meters between them. As the fourteenth hour approached, older students still having to pass an exam in the afternoon finished their sandwiches in haste and returned to the building, leaving two fifteen years old alone. 

 

“I… Are you doing anything?” Hanzo had asked. “Because I wanted to talk, so…”

 

Jesse had just let out a big old raspberry, not knowing what to say, too nervous to say anything. 

 

Then, Hanzo’s legs had started moving and Jesse had been so scared they were about to move away, Jesse just screamed: 

 

“I’m sorry, let’s go to Efes, my foster mom gave me two Tickets Restau.”

 

Hanzo lifted an eyebrow and suddenly, he smirked. 

 

“Do you always ask the boys you like out to a kebab restaurant saying you’ll pay with tickets?”

 

Jesse, shocked managed to make his mouth function and he still smiled about it. 

 

“What, we’re Lycéens! Do you expect me to buy you dinner at the Ritz, drive you in my limousine to the nearest Hilton… Oh wait, we don’t have a license!” Jesse added, bringing the back of his hand to his forehead, feigning shock. “How could we possibly go out together, Hanzo. I am so unbearably underage and poor!”

 

“Stop that!” Hanzo had snapped. 

 

Jesse had snapped his mouth shut. Maybe he had been wrong. Maybe Hanzo had actually come to explain he didn’t reciprocate his feelings. After all, the right preference did not mean…

 

Hanzo took a step toward Jesse and the other boy suddenly straightened his spine and squared his shoulders, preparing himself. Hanzo shuffled the book beneath his arm and took his hand. He seemed to be battling with something. 

 

“I would really like to go to Efes. You will pay me a döner with salad, tomatoes and onions, with ketchup and cream with one of your mother’s tickets. Then we’ll talk about how our dates are going to be, because this is the last time I step foot in that restaurant, despite it being very clean from what I know of this type of establishment.”

 

Hanzo had let go of Jesse’s hand and started to walk. Stunned, Jesse watched him until he stopped for a second. Only then did he realise the boy had truly asked him out. 

 

Neither of them actually ordered onions in their kebab and the cook manning the döner spit winked at them when he heard their order. 

 

Hanzo did a lot of stop that. Mostly when Jesse tried to kiss him. Hand holding was ok, though. 

 

Much like in the cafeteria. In fact, anything more than handholding in public was prohibited. Wednesdays afternoons, however…

 

Hanzo liked to study in the library the whole Wednesday afternoon. Jesse learned how to coax him away to visit the park within the school grounds and even once, sneak past the fence separating it from the woods bordering Montdrain-sur-L’Yson and the bigger town of La Garenne-Rancy, where Jesse lived and the school was technically situated. 

 

There, in the woods, they had talked, picked-nicked, kissed, even nervously explored each other. Hanzo said stop several times, but always would come back to touch him or kiss him, starting a new avenue of caresses Jesse was content to follow. It had been thrilling. Jesse, having no clue himself of how to actually carry on with their more heated kisses, enjoyed and respected his need for taking his time and his clear instructions when it became too much to bear. 

 

They lunched together all the time, now. They had shared each other’s schedules. At some point, Hanzo had almost cried after being given back a Maths mock exam with a very bad grade. As an ES student with a Maths specialty, bringing the multiplier up from five to seven, the real thing would have spelled the end of the little advance he got from his French exam. 

 

And on Tuesdays like these, Jesse would cheer Hanzo up for his Kendo training. 

 

The American didn’t understand a lot about Kendo. There was a lot of shouts, a lot of bouncing on tiptoes and he knew they didn’t have the right to  _ tsuki _ , which was apparently in professional Kendo, a strike straight for the throat that earned a shitload of point but was considered too advanced for students who had yet to pass their first  _ dan _ . 

 

Jesse also had a free period at that time before shuffling to three hours of Arts Studies. 

 

He loved watching Hanzo train. Kendo demanded more grace than, say, Judo or other martial arts he knew. The armour was impressive too, and Hanzo handled his with such care and reverence. In fact, every time he took Jesse’s hand, he did the same exact movement. He handled Jesse like he would his priceless imported gear. 

 

Jesse, realising that, wondered if it could truly be taken as a compliment. 

 

Still, the worst part of the day was accompanying Hanzo to the bus taking him home two cities over. 

 

“Why can’t I invite you home, already?” Hanzo asked as they sat, waiting at the overcrowded bus. 

 

It was also one of the rare moments where Hanzo allowed a full bear hug and a tongue kiss in public. 

 

“Because I’m a fostered kid and that would mean loads of paperwork.” Jesse answered with a sigh. “Your dad still doesn’t want you to come to the big bad city. Come on, I don’t even live in the bad part of town.”

 

“He still thinks cars are set on fire every night and the Charia law is applied in the Pâquerettes neighbourhood...”

 

“Doomfist lives in the Pâquerettes. We could ask him.” Jesse smiled onto Hanzo’s hair. 

 

“You’re ridiculous. Stop it.” Hanzo said, playfully tapping Jesse’s nose with his finger. 

 

The rumble of the bus and the chatter of the Lycéens started to rev and growl around them. It was the end of the day. 

 

“I was thinking.” Jesse asked as Hanzo retrieved his bus pass from his pocket. “I’m seventeen now… There’s a few things I need to ask my foster mother and… Well… My birthday’s coming soon… If it’s a party on neutral grounds, maybe your dad won’t be as worried...”

 

Hanzo’s smile was wide and his eyes filled with hope. He gave Jesse one last kiss before hurrying to the honking bus, filled to the brim with the kids living up in Montdrain and beyond. Jesse started the walk down to his home. He was at the door when his phone buzzed in his pocket. 

 

**Han - KeurKeur**

I would really like to see your home.

 

Jesse smiled and dropped his bag near the living room’s table. His phone buzzed again. 

 

**Han - KeurKeur**

I mean, we’ve been dating for almost two years now.

 

**McCree, Jesse**

Im shy i dnt like to ask Sabrine abt too much stff

 

**Han - KeurKeur**

Alright, don’t worry, I was just teasing. I like our pace. I feel good with you. 

 

**Han - KeurKeur**

:*

 

Jesse’s heart leaped when he saw the smiley. Hanzo didn’t use much of those. He liked to think he only used them with him because Jesse definitely used plenty. 

 

**McCree, Jesse**

Hanzo?

 

**Han - KeurKeur**

Yes?

 

**McCree, Jesse**

I like our pace too. What we have feels more powerful that way.

 

“Sabrine?” Jesse called, barely managing to tear his eyes from his phone. “I gotta ask you something.”

  
Just like Jesse never texted full sentences to just anybody, he thought with a lovestruck grin.

**Author's Note:**

> If you're curious, I'm open to questions in the comments.   
> Special thanks to Charlie and Abbarach for assuming the role of sensitivity readers for the trans!McCree parts


End file.
